"Prey" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... lofty were the air and gesture of Adrian, as he thus spoke, that even the rude servitors felt a thrill of approbation and remorse—not so Martino di Porto. He had been struck with the beauty of the prey thus suddenly snatched from him; he had been accustomed to long outrage and to long impunity; the very sight, the very voice of a Colonna, was a blight to his eye and a discord to his ear: what, then, when a Colonna interfered with ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... and sinful acts; these are their meat and drink. I make them gasp sometimes. My heart laughs quite merrily to think of it. When I am hungry, and there is something tempting on the table, hunger, like a serpent, comes creeping up into my throat and laps its dry tongue with eagerness for its prey, but it often returns chagrined ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... ago, when the emigrant ships used to unload their swarms of homeless and friendless strangers into the streets of New Orleans to fall a prey to yellow-fever or cholera, that solemn pile sheltered thousands on thousands of desolate and plague-stricken Irish and Germans, receiving them unquestioned, until at times the very floors were covered with the sick and dying, and the sawing and hammering in the ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... and teazing because scandal, routs, finery, fans, china, lovers, lap-dogs, or squirrels, are her constant themes. Her amusements, like those of a magpie, are only hopping over the same spots, prying into the same corners, and devouring the same species of prey. The simple and beautiful delineations of nature, in her countenance, gestures and whole deportment, are habitually arranged, distorted, or concealed, by the affected adoption of whatever grimace or deformity is ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... hole in the ice he places himself on hands and knees, and casts his blanket over him, so as to darken the water and conceal himself from observation; in this position he will remain for hours, patiently watching the approach of his prey, which he strikes with admirable precision as soon as it appears within the ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... he had no strength remaining to him to consume it, but crept to his bed like the toad into winter. Now, meanwhile a steam arose from the mess, and he lay stretched. So it befel that the birds of prey of the region scented the mess, and they descended and thronged at that man's windows. And the man's neighbours looked up at them, for it was the sign of one who is fit for the beaks of birds, lying unburied. Fail to spread the pall one hour where suns are decisive, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... such things; it's all talk. If people have feeling, they will show it,—they can't help it; but, then, it's a great misfortune to have feeling. I'd rather have been made like St. Clare. My feelings prey upon me so!" ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... fitted me to win the love of women. Listen to me,—kindly, if you can; forgive me, at least. Half my life has been passed in constant fear and anguish, without any near friend to share my trials. My task is done now; my fears have ceased to prey upon me; the sharpness of early sorrows has yielded something of its edge to time. You have bound me to you by gratitude in the tender care you have taken of my poor child. More than this. I must tell you all now, out of the depth of this trouble through which I am passing. I have ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... out in opposition, first he shall have many tortures, and then shall be executed by the sword, or thrown into the deep sea, or given as a prey to birds and dogs; ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... not hear the treacherous call That bids me stay and rest awhile, For I have found that, one and all, They seek me for a prey and spoil. ...
— Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 • S.M. Fuller
... hands of thy worthy confederate. Thou mayst, I think, succeed in taking her from her Saxon friends, but how thou wilt rescue her afterwards from the clutches of Bois-Guilbert seems considerably more doubtful—He is a falcon well accustomed to pounce on a partridge, and to hold his prey fast." ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... gives objectivity to trouble, that lifts the cloud so far that, if but for a moment, it shows itself a cloud, instead of being felt an enveloping, penetrating, palsying mist—setting it where the mind can in its turn prey upon it, can play with it, paint it, may come to sing of it, is a great help toward what health may yet be possible for the troubled soul. With a woman's instinct, Dorothy borrowed from the curate a volume of a certain more attractive edition ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... irregular, and wide-reaching, and requiring centuries for their accomplishment. Gibbon's manner of dealing with the first is always good, and sometimes consummate, and equal to anything in historical literature. The thirty-first chapter, with its description of Rome, soon to fall a prey to the Goths and Alaric, is a masterpiece, artistic and spacious in the highest degree; though it is unnecessary to cite particular instances, as nearly every chapter contains passages of admirable historic power. But the noble flood of narrative never stops in meditative pause to review the situation, ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... processes of chemistry more subtle than were ever executed in Liebig's laboratory, and producing structures more cunning than man can imitate. The bird builds her nest, the spider shapes out its delicate web, and stretches it in the path of his prey; directed not by calculating thought, as we conceive ourselves to be, but by some motive influence, our ignorance of the nature of which we disguise from ourselves, and call it instinct, but which we believe at least to be some property residing in the organisation. We are not to suppose that ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... fat, then this amount will be taken from the muscles and the more vital tissues, and the organism will finally succumb. Before this time is reached there will be a great lowering of resistance, and the individual will be a prey to the infectious diseases. ...
— Diet and Health - With Key to the Calories • Lulu Hunt Peters
... him, and every heart wished him the empire. The envious man saw him pass; he frowned and turned aside. The people conducted him to the place where the assembly was held. The queen, who was informed of his arrival, became a prey to the most violent agitations of hope and fear. She was filled with anxiety and apprehension. She could not comprehend why Zadig was without arms, nor why Itobad wore the white armor. A confused murmur arose at the sight of Zadig. They were equally surprised and charmed to see him; but none but ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne
... sharks and crocodiles and whales. Indeed, with the assistance of that bird, I have passed through thy dominions like unto a Himalayan valley, impenetrable and inaccessible in consequence of trunks of (fallen) trees and scattered rocks and thorny shrubs and lions and tigers and other beasts of prey. The learned say that a region inaccessible in consequence of gloom can be passed through with the aid of a light, and a river that is unfordable can be crossed by means of a boat. No means, however, exist for penetrating or passing through the labyrinth of kingly affairs. Thy kingdom is like an ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... Bolshevikis come in now—" this was one of the things which Paul had been told. "'Down with the capitalists who prey on women!' That's them! But it hasn't caught on. Sounds sort of flat around here to those who know the women. So this bunch of Bols has been laying low the last few days. They've hired a boat and go fishing in the lake. They ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... had made famous. It was characteristic of the man that he preferred to strike at an enemy ship in a wild, breath-taking swoop, even as the fierce hawk plummets from high heaven to sink its talons deep into the flesh of its more sluggish prey. Nerves were uncomfortable things to have on such occasions, and Harkness had them, and accordingly he felt his heart hammer and something tight seemed to bind his throat. He tried to assume the unshakable calmness of the motionless figure at the stick, but could ...
— Hawk Carse • Anthony Gilmore
... a feeling of genuine pleasure, the figure of Mrs. Habersham a few paces ahead of him. The prospect of her society, if only for a block or so, was a welcome relief to him. He felt rather aggrievedly that he had been the prey of bores during the entire day, skilfully escaping one, only to be firmly button-holed by another. Therefore he quickened his steps to overtake Mrs. Habersham, whom he had always ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... no care was taken of this, anybody that wished might have it. This we call the share of poetasters. But Suttung's mead Odin gave to the asas and to those men who are able to make verses. Hence we call songship Odin's prey, Odin's find, Odin's drink, Odin's gift, and ...
— The Younger Edda - Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda • Snorre
... fluent heat began, And grew to seeming-random forms, The seeming prey of cyclic storms, Till at the last arose ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... in Italy again. The world was a peaceful world, because Opulence, inflated and moderate, had gone out of town: the former to its country-house, or a foreign hotel; the latter to lodgings at the seaside to bathe out of machines and prey on shrimps. The lull that reigned in and about Sapps Court was no doubt a sort of recoil or backwater from other neighbourhoods, with high salaries or real and personal estate, whose dwellings were closed and ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... a net out of her own vitals with which to capture her prey, but the net is not a part of herself as the leaf is a part of the tree. The spider repairs her damaged net, but the tree never repairs its leaves. It may put forth new leaves, but it never essays to patch up the old ones. Every tree has such ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... plays her part with spirit. But she is no match for the submarine tactics of her rescuer, who seems just as happy under water as on land, and rising under her at the end of a resolute deep plunge, makes a successful grasp at the head of her prey, who is ignominiously towed into safety, doing her best to ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... former from escaping from slavery. I would keep the merciless slaveholder profoundly ignorant of the means of flight adopted by the slave. I would leave him to imagine himself surrounded by myriads of invisible tormentors, ever ready to snatch from his infernal grasp his trembling prey. Let him be left to feel his way in the dark; let darkness commensurate with his crime hover over him; and let him feel that at every step he takes, in pursuit of the flying bondman, he is running the frightful risk of having his hot brains dashed out by an invisible agency. Let us render the ...
— The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass - An American Slave • Frederick Douglass
... pursuit of the Trojans, Patroclus is about to scale the walls of Troy, when Apollo reminds him the city is not to fall a prey either to him or to his friend. Then, in the midst of a duel in which Patroclus engages with Hector, Apollo snatches the helmet off the Greek hero's head, leaving him thus exposed to his foe's deadly blows. ...
— The Book of the Epic • Helene A. Guerber
... the walls, with pistols, a sword, or some other weapon within reach. That these people do immense damage there is no doubt, as they not only plunder the country people of buffaloes and horses, but rifle their houses, if no better prey is to be had, to such an extent, that the natives are afraid to live at any distance from each other in many parts of the country, solely through fear of them. From this cause, patches of fine paddy land in out-of-the-way districts are left uncultivated, or are hurriedly ploughed and sown ...
— Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines - During 1848, 1849 and 1850 • Robert Mac Micking
... flung himself forward; but Darrell, whose eye had never quitted the foe, was prepared for and eluded the rush. Losely, missing his object, lost his balance, struck against the edge of the table which partially interposed between himself and his prey, and was only saved from falling by the close neighbourhood of the wall, on which he came with a shock that for the moment well-nigh stunned him. Meanwhile Darrell had gained the hearth, and snatched from it a large log half-burning. Jasper, recovering himself, ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... are enough, and more than enough, for themselves. But with us, alas! it is not so. In Naples there exists seventy thousand souls, and out of these scarcely ten or fifteen thousand do any work, and they are always lean from overwork and are getting weaker every day. The rest become a prey to idleness, avarice, ill-health, lasciviousness, usury and other vices, and contaminate and corrupt very many families by holding them in servitude for their own use, by keeping them in poverty and slavishness, and by imparting to ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... Paris, a prey to Bonaparte; a monstrous spectacle. The gloomy armed men massed together on this boulevard felt an appalling spirit enter into them; they ceased to be themselves, ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo
... deficient in bravery, for they fought as stoutly against the Romans as did our own hardy ancestors. After having been for hundreds of years subject to the Roman yoke, and having no occasion to use arms, they lost their manly virtues, and when the Romans left them were an easy prey for the first comer. Our fathers could not foresee that the time would come when they too in turn would be invaded. Had they done so, methinks they would not have set up so broad a line of separation ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... else on this account, that on the contrary, this excursion of the Numidians was a proof to him that Hannibal and his army had not moved from his camp. Early in the night Hannibal put his troops in motion, and Philemenus, with his customary burden of prey taken in hunting, was his guide. The rest of the conspirators waited the accomplishment of what had been concerted; and the agreement was, that Philemenus, while bringing in his prey through the ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... a collapse is inevitable. We are anxiously waiting to see it come; any change would be for the better. We were long threatened with a war of races, if we did not sustain Spanish rule in the island. That is, if we were not loyal to the Madrid authorities, the slaves should be freed to prey upon us. Blood would flow like water. The incendiary torch would be placed in the hands of the negroes, and they should be incited to burn, steal, and ravish! Cuba should be Spanish or African. There was a time when this threat had great force, and its ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou
... her death certain, she had the inexpressible joy of finding that her motionless posture had been the means of saving her from the vigilant eyes of the cat, who passed on quite unconcerned without taking any notice of her prey. For an instant Downy could scarce credit her own eyes when she saw her enemy pass on; but fearing that if puss should return, she should not again escape so miraculously, she darted away as she hoped unseen, but, silly little thing! she had better ...
— Little Downy - The History of A Field-Mouse • Catharine Parr Traill
... to that part; when you relax it, you "let go" completely. What we want is Strength in Repose ready to leap into action in the flash of an eye. We have taught you how to relax in Lesson 2 on Will-Force. You all have noticed a cat crouching for its prey. How intensely still it is; yet you know what such stillness means. It is very far from laziness. Relaxation husbands and conserves nerve-force. It is a great thing to be calm and silent. Calmness is the centralization ...
— The Doctrine and Practice of Yoga • A. P. Mukerji
... and for your mother pray, Who made less drear for you life's desert way, For all the portions of your heart that lie Shut in the tomb, alas, each youthful tie Is lost within the coffin's close constraint, Where, prey of worms, the dead send up ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... horns of the monster, lately so much beloved. Abandoned I have left my father's house, abandoned I procrastinate my doom. O if any of the gods hear this, I wish I may wander naked among lions: before foul decay seizes my comely cheeks, and moisture leaves this tender prey, I desire, in all my beauty, to be the food of tigers." "Base Europa," thy absent father urges, "why do you hesitate to die? you may strangle your neck suspended from this ash, with your girdle that has commodiously attended you. Or if a precipice, and the rocks that are edged ...
— The Works of Horace • Horace
... charity toward the slaveholders teaches us also, forbearing all thought of base and demoralizing compositions, to press the hand steadily upon the hilt it has grasped, until war's work is done. These servants of a predaceous principle are nearly, if not quite, its earliest prey. Enemies to us, they are twice enemies to themselves. They are driven helplessly on, and will be so until we slay the tyrant that wrings from them their evil services. During that fatal month's siesta at Yorktown, the country was horror-stricken ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... has been a prey to factions, torn by intestine commotions and foreign wars. But all has changed: all nations have embraced the French, and have sworn to them peace and amity: the French people have embraced each other, and have sworn to be all friends and brothers. ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... diminutive, shapeless shrub called vruca, which is a synonym for all that is worthless. The soul of the traitor is condemned to wander through the air, and every time it sees this shrub it pauses, and imagines it sees its miserable body dangling from it, the prey of birds and dogs.[8] This popular legend is told ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane
... contains what would naturally have been the most vigorous and stirring parts of the poem: the riotous drinking of Holofernes, the trenchant act of Judith, her return with her maid to Bethulia, their enthusiastic reception, the muster for battle, the anticipation of carnage by the birds and beasts of prey, the destruction ...
— Anglo-Saxon Literature • John Earle
... them are limited to the terminal region. In the majority of zoological books in which Cephalopoda are described, nothing is said of the use or function of these two special arms. Observation of the living animal in aquaria has shown that their functions is to capture active prey such as prawns. They act as a kind of double lasso. Sepia, for instance, approaches gently and cautiously till it is within striking distance of a prawn, then the two long tentacles are suddenly and swiftly shot out from their sockets and the prawn is caught between ...
— Hormones and Heredity • J. T. Cunningham
... and energy spend their force, and then the man, quite another man it would seem, veers round; the once dauntless hero is now daunted by shadows, by thoughts, by nothing. Those strong beings, who laugh when their hearts are cut out alive, are the prey of vague thoughts. Already in that far-off time their world, which appears to us so young, seemed old to them. They were acquainted with causeless regrets, vain sorrows, and disgust of life. No literature has produced a greater number of disconsolate poems. ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... weeping, and her children are living on the bread of charity sent them by neighbors far and near. And France—the German Army, like a wild beast, has fastened its claws deep into her soil, and every effort to drag them out rends and tears the living flesh of that beautiful land. The beast of prey has not leaped to our shores—not a hair of Britain's head has been touched by him. Why? Because of the vigilant watchdog that patrols the deep for us; and that is my complaint against the British Navy. It does not enable us to realize that Britain at the present moment ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... showed perhaps here and there in sheltered places. Sheep and goats grazed then as now over the hills, and herds of cattle began to cover the Lowlands. The men, too, were possibly beginning to grow a trifle less like two-legged beasts of prey, though still rough as the very wolves they hunted; bare-legged, wild-eyed hunter-herdsmen with—who can doubt it?—flocks of children ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless
... period in ancient history. The king had left no legitimate son—no one with an undisputed title to the succession. On his deathbed Alexander had himself declared that the realm should go "to the strongest." [12] It was certain, under these circumstances, that his possessions would become the prey of the leading Macedonian generals. The unwieldy empire at length broke in pieces. Out of the fragments arose three great states, namely, Macedonia, Egypt, and Syria. The kingdom of Egypt was ruled by Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals. Seleucus, another ...
— EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY • HUTTON WEBSTER
... death—but indicating life enough in its intense expression of inward pain—and speechless, save that at intervals in a low tone, 'Zenobia! Palmyra!' fell from her scarcely moving lips. To Gracchus and myself essaying to divert her from thoughts that seemed to prey upon her very life, she said, 'Leave me to wrestle alone with my grief; it is the way to strength. I do not doubt ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware
... the Kitten out. The shake of the beast of prey seemed to have stunned the victim, really to have saved it much suffering. The Kitten seemed unharmed, but giddy. It tottered in a circle for a time, then slowly revived, and a few minutes later was purring in the negro's lap, ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... cheated his boyish ardour. She had taken unfair advantage of him, as her brother had at play. They were his own flesh and blood, and they ought to have spared him. Instead, one and the other had made a prey of him, and had used him for their selfish ends. He thought how they had betrayed the rights of hospitality: how they had made a victim of the young kinsman who came confiding within their gates. His heart was sore wounded: his head sank back ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... power in the field of industry. The financial policy, left in the hands of Chase, may truly be described as barren of ideas. Incidentally, it may be mentioned that the "loyal" North was left at the mercy of its domestic enemies and a prey to parasites by Chase's policy of loans instead of taxes and of voluntary support instead of ...
— Abraham Lincoln and the Union - A Chronicle of the Embattled North, Volume 29 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Nathaniel W. Stephenson
... (1331-1355) whose realm included Albania, Macedonia, Epirus, Thessaly and northern Greece. The Servian incursion was followed by a great Albanian emigration to the southern regions of the Peninsula. After Dushan's death his empire disappeared, and Servia fell a prey to anarchy. For a short time the Bosnians, under their king Stephen Tvrtko (1353-1391), became the principal power in the west of the Peninsula. The disorganization and internecine feuds of the various states prepared ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... of society over the savage state; as the number of mankind becomes increased a thousand fold by the arts of agriculture and pasturage; and their happiness is probably under good governments improved in as great a proportion, as they become liberated from the hourly fear of beasts of prey, from the daily fear of famine, and of the occasional incursions of their ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin
... of, unless I had always thought of England. The people were civil, and much more moderate in their demands than the Norwegians, particularly to the westward, where they boldly charge for what you never had, and seem to consider you, as they do a wreck, if not as lawful prey, yet as a lucky chance, which they ought not to neglect ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... unfold; Declare the terms that I am to obey; My will to yours submissively I mould, And from your law my feet shall never stray. Would you I die, to silent grief a prey? Then count me even now as dead and cold; Would you I tell my woes in some new way? Then shall my tale by Love itself be told. The unison of opposites to prove, Of the soft wax and diamond hard am I; But still, obedient to the laws of love, Here, ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... Between that ledge and himself a tangle of bushes clutched the steep bank. He looked straight into the tangle, just plain twig and brown leaf, giving place as he stared, for two still black human eyes looking balefully at him as a snake at its prey. Lloyd Fenneben could not withdraw his gaze. The two eyes—no other human token visible—just two cruel human eyes full of human hate were fixed on him. And the fascination of the thing was paralyzing, horrible. He could not move nor utter ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter
... charm for him. He here found a quiet and secluded refuge amidst that ceaseless roar of the markets which made him dream of some surging sea spreading around him, and isolating him from the world. Gradually, however, a vague nervousness began to prey upon him; he became discontented, accused himself of faults which he could not define, and began to rebel against the emptiness which he experienced more and more acutely in mind and body. Then, too, the evil smells of the fish market brought him nausea. By degrees he became unhinged, ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... sound, and the small eyes gleamed maliciously. "Do you believe it is a poisonous species?" asked Ayrault. "I suspect it is," replied the doctor; "for, though it is doubtless able to leap with great accuracy upon its prey, we saw it took some time to recharge the upper air-chamber, so that, were it not armed with poison glands, it would fall an easy victim to its more powerful and swifter contemporaries, and would ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor
... neighborhood squabbles and domestic wrangles. Their greatest services are rendered in the majority of cases which never call for arrest and prosecution. That there are many instances of petty "graft," and that, in some cases, the "middle men" prey on the ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... the Martinmas tyde, When our Border steeds get corn and hay The captain of Bewcastle hath bound him to ryde, And he's ower to Tividale to drive a prey. ...
— A Collection of Ballads • Andrew Lang
... your child to learn those petty arts of deception without which she must fall an easy prey to any one who wishes to deceive her? How can she detect lying in other people unless she has had some experience of it in her own practice? How, again, can she learn when it will be well for her to lie, and when to refrain from doing so, unless ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... brooks were diversified with flowers; every blast shook spices from the rocks; and every month dropped fruits upon the ground. All animals that bite the grass, or browse the shrub, whether wild or tame, wandered in this extensive circuit, secured from beasts of prey, by the mountains which confined them. On one part, were flocks and herds feeding in the pastures; on another, all the beasts of chase frisking in the lawns; the sprightly kid was bounding on the rocks, the subtle monkey frolicking in the trees, and ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... ordinary idea, and would hardly deserve the qualification of "triumphant," which we have given it at the commencement of this chapter, if it were not accompanied by that of taking it back again. Adolphe was seduced by a wish, which invariably seizes persons who are the prey of misfortune, to know how far an evil will go!—to try how much damage fire will do when left to itself, the individual possessing, or thinking he possesses, the power to arrest it. This curiosity pursues us from the cradle to the grave. Then, ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... rescue party for the thief, in the shape of a partner,—who could tell? And realising, if he caught the man at all, he must do one of his sprints, he covered the ground by a series of flying leaps,—dashed in where he saw his prey rush; one more leap with all his might, and—"I have you!" ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney
... life relaxed and feeble; think! when the fire shall burn the body always, what length of sleep will then be possible? For when the hateful brood of sorrow rising through space, with all its attendant horrors, meeting the mind o'erwhelmed by sleep and death, shall seize its prey, who then shall ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various
... thou not how the Deity has rais'd The countenance of man erect to heav'n, Gazing sublime, while prone to earth he bent Th' inferior tribes, reptiles, and pasturing herds, And beasts of prey, ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust
... known, who first, who last, Roused from the slumber on that fiery couch, At their great Emperor's call, as next in worth Came singly where he stood on the bare strand, While the promiscuous crowd stood yet aloof? The chief were those who, from the pit of Hell Roaming to seek their prey on Earth, durst fix Their seats, long after, next the seat of God, Their altars by his altar, gods adored Among the nations round, and durst abide Jehovah thundering out of Sion, throned Between the Cherubim; yea, often placed Within ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... very popular with boys if they could be sure of finding such good friends as Glen had met. The reverse is more commonly true. Glen knew well enough that the boy on the road, trusting to chance for friends, is much more apt to fall a prey to people of the J. Jervice variety. He remembered the pitiful plight of a boy who had been returned to the school after falling into the hands of tramps, and he thanked an unknown Providence that he had tumbled into the kind arms ...
— The Boy Scout Treasure Hunters - The Lost Treasure of Buffalo Hollow • Charles Henry Lerrigo
... Your buzarde is a kynde of byrde of prey, Your lordship knowes too, that will feede on all Unable to outflye or to resist, But suche pursued her basenes and her sloathe At once apeare. You understand ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... must be true that the lives of most birds and animals end in tragedy, so numerous, alert, and persistent are their foes. As soon as a bird begins to grow old and infirm, losing its keenness of vision and its swiftness of movement, it cannot help falling a prey to its rapacious enemies. For this reason you seldom find a feeble animal or bird in the open, or one that has lain down and ...
— Our Bird Comrades • Leander S. (Leander Sylvester) Keyser
... flashed up the river reach in letters of fire. London was indeed very beautiful that night. Without hope she would have seemed not only as beautiful but as terrible as a black panther crouching on her prey. Our hope redeemed her. Beyond her dark and meretricious splendours, beyond her throned presence jewelled with links and points and cressets of fire, crowned with stars, robed in the night, hiding cruelties, I caught a moment's vision of the coming City of Mankind, of a city ...
— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells
... voice approach, and hearing likewise whose it was (for as the squire more than once roared forth the word daughter, so Sophia, in the midst of her struggling, cried out upon her father), he thought proper to relinquish his prey, having only disordered her handkerchief, and with his rude lips committed violence on her ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... fell asleep as they stood. But what a wonderful thing now happened! In a short time they were all so transformed that none retained her human shape, but some were changed into snakes, wolves, bears, toads, swine, or cats, and others became hawks or other birds of prey. But among all these bestial forms was a beautiful rose-bush, covered with flowers, and with two doves nestling on its branches. And this was the gardener's daughter whom the king had chosen as his consort. Then said the king, "We have now seen ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... in the habit of mourning for past events, but a failure incites him to renewed exertions, and inspires his genius to perform fresh and daring exploits. Although the lion for once may have seen his prey slip from his grasp, it does not render him dispirited. He only shakes his mane, and crouches for a ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... fishes were caught; both were very small; the one malacopterygious, and resembling the pike, would remain at times motionless at the bottom, or dart at its prey; the other belonged to the perches, and had an oblong compressed body, and three dark stripes perpendicular to its length; this would hover through the water, and nibble at the bait. Silurus and ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... sight. He had now penetrated into the jungle—into the black forest where stalked the savage lions, intent on getting other prey. Mr. Durban and Mr. Anderson vainly tried to pierce the darkness to see something at which to shoot. Ned Newton had eagerly started to follow his chum, but could not discern where Tom was. A nameless fear clutched at the lad's heart. Mr. Damon was softly blessing everything ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Rifle • Victor Appleton
... but he recognized that this was a supremely able one. He felt like a man holding a fierce bloodhound in leash. There were curs to do the smaller work; but some day he would slip this creature upon its prey. A few members of the lodge, Ted Baldwin among them, resented the rapid rise of the stranger and hated him for it; but they kept clear of him, for he was as ready to fight ...
— The Valley of Fear • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... purpose, I beheld them that minute in those lovely eyes of hers. Ay, they were lovely eyes: they could gleam soft as a dove's when she would, and they could shoot forth flames like a lioness robbed of her prey. Never saw I those eyes look fiercer nor eviller than that night when Sir Hugh Le Despenser stood ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... fact in this case is that efforts for universal and compulsory education cannot keep pace with the overproduction of children. Even at the best, leaving out of consideration the public school system as the inevitable prey and plundering-ground of the cheap politician and job-hunter, present methods of wholesale and syndicated "education" are not suited to compete with the unceasing, unthinking, untiring procreative powers of our ...
— The Pivot of Civilization • Margaret Sanger
... in this latter part of their office, that of serving writs, and making arrests and executions, it is now usual to join special bailiffs with them; who are generally mean persons employed by the sheriffs on account only of their adroitness and dexterity in hunting and seising their prey. The sheriff being answerable for the misdemesnors of these bailiffs, they are therefore usually bound in a bond for the due execution of their office, and thence are called bound-bailiffs; which the common people have corrupted into ...
— Commentaries on the Laws of England - Book the First • William Blackstone
... might and mastery. To worship thee I will not wond,[54] That four kings of uncouth land To-day hast sent into my hand, And of riches great array. Therefore of all that I can win To give thee tithe I will begin, When I the city soon come in, And share with thee my prey. Melchisedec, that here king is And God's priest also, I wis, The tithe I will give him of this, As just is, what I do. God who has sent me victory O'er four kings graciously, With him my spoil share will I, The ...
— Everyman and Other Old Religious Plays, with an Introduction • Anonymous
... pinions beat the skies; A bleeding serpent of enormous size His talons trussed; alive and curling round She stung the bird, whose throat receiv'd the wound. Mad with the smart he drops the fatal prey, In airy circles wings his painful way, Floats on the winds, and rends the heavens with cries: Amid the hosts the fallen serpent lies; They, pale with terror, mark its spires unroll'd, And Jove's portent with beating ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... frozen sun, Against th' invader doomed to writhe, To rouse the Tartar, Russ, and Hun! Bid terror to the battle ride! Indignant honour, burning shame, Revenge, and hate, and patriotic pride! But not the quick unerring aim Of volley'd thunder winged with flame, Nor famine keener than the bird of prey, Nor death—avail the hard of heart to tame! Blow wind, and pierce the dire array, Flung, drifted by thy breath, athwart ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various
... father, by her impression, a Frenchman with a name one knew, had been a different matter, leaving his child, she clearly recalled, a memory all fondness, as well as an assured little fortune which was unluckily to make her more or less of a prey later on. She had been in particular, at school, dazzlingly, though quite booklessly, clever; as polyglot as a little Jewess (which she wasn't, oh no!) and chattering French, English, German, Italian, anything one would, in a way that made a clean ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... in less than three days we were fairly seated in our new abode. However, as we had not time to carry away our poultry, we left them upon the hill till the place we had appropriated for them was completed. It was fenced on all sides, and covered with a large net, to prevent the birds of prey taking away our little chickens, and we had no fear in leaving them during the night. On the evening of the next day, my sister, accompanied with the children, went to feed the various inhabitants of the poultry-yard; ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... attitude of the Government, popular feeling was manifested in different ways. A committee of ladies in Paris made a direct appeal to the French people. They declared: "We are not biased enemies of the British Nation ... but we have a horror of grasping financiers, the men of prey who have concocted in cold blood this rascally war. They have committed with premeditation a crime of lese-humanite, the greatest of crimes. May the blood which reddens the battle-fields of South Africa forever be upon their heads.... Yes, we are heart and soul ...
— Neutral Rights and Obligations in the Anglo-Boer War • Robert Granville Campbell
... be taken away by Black's P-Kt3, whilst Black's passed pawn at his B3 can be isolated at any time through P-R4-R5. White would take up a position on the Knight's file with the King, and push on the Rook's pawn. The isolated pawns are then an easy prey. On the text move White also pushes the Rook's pawn on to compel P-R3 and reduce Black to moves by the King. The passed ...
— Chess Strategy • Edward Lasker
... report to Mr. Bolton only progress, and this was not a cheerful message for him to send to Philadelphia in reply to inquiries that he thought became more and more anxious. Philip himself was a prey to the constant fear that the money would give out before the coal ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 6. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... del Mare were lost to his eyes in the night. He looked for them still. He strained his eyes to see them. But the powerful night would not yield up its prey. ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... They saw in the hosts of Pharaoh the old Teuton warriors, with the bright-shining bucklers, and the voice of the trumpets and the waving of banners. Over the doomed host the poet of "Exodus" saw the vultures soaring in circles, hungry for the fight, when the doomed warriors should be their prey, and heard the wolves howling their direful evensong, deeming their food nigh them. Here is the description of the Destruction of the Egyptians. The translation is ...
— Our Catholic Heritage in English Literature of Pre-Conquest Days • Emily Hickey
... very little—that is to say, those who, like the Congo cannibal, or the Red Indian, or the Bedouin, do not cultivate, or divide their labour, or trade, or save, or look to the future, have shed little of the primitive passions of other animals of prey, the tigers and the wolves, who have no economics at all, and have no need to check an impulse or a hate. But industry, even of the more primitive kind, means that men must divide their labour, which means that they must put some sort ...
— Peace Theories and the Balkan War • Norman Angell
... at Colombo, feeding on rice, fruit, and vegetables. It was partial to ants and, other insects, and was always eager for milk or the bone of a fowl. The naturally slow motion of its limbs enables the loris to approach its prey so stealthily that it seizes birds before they can be alarmed by its presence. The natives assert that it has been known to strangle the pea-fowl at night, to feast on the brain. During the day the one which I kept was usually asleep in the strange position ...
— Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon • J. Emerson Tennent
... descendants of persons of rank equal to our own. Among these are gentlemen—brave, handsome, and equally fascinating. It would indeed be a very extraordinary case if the Lady Rosamond, with all her beauty and accomplishments, daily surrounded by an admiring crowd, should not unconsciously fall a prey to her already susceptible nature. Sir Thomas," continued her ladyship, with more vehemence in her manner, "you do not seem to weigh matters as I do, or you would certainly see the error you have committed—the great wrong you have done to your child. Were I to disclose the facts, ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour
... gazelle was struggling in the crocodile's jaws. A cry of horror burst from the men in the boat, and every man seized a musket; but before an aim could be taken the struggle was over; the monster had dived with its prey, and nothing but a few streaks of red foam floated on ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne
... loyal Germans; they drove back the Bolsheviki in confusion, taking their guns and supplies, and destroying their cities; they led off the Russian women and children into slavery, precisely as if they were Belgian or French women and children, destined by the German Gott as the legitimate prey of Kultur. They sacked Riga and Reval, they overran all the Eastern portions of Russia—Courland, Livonia, Esthonia; they moved into the rich grain country of Southern Russia, the Ukraine; they landed from their ships and took Finland, wiping out the liberties of that splendid people. ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... nothing visible of the havoc and the prey and plunder. It is certain that much of the visible life passes violently into other forms, flashes without pause into another flame; but not all. Amid all the killing there must be much dying. There ...
— The Colour of Life • Alice Meynell
... that he was induced to this by a celestial vision in his sleep. He saw a hen endeavoring to gather all her chickens under her wings, to protect them from a hawk; she could not cover them all, and many were about to become its prey; but another large bird appeared, spread its wings over them, and preserved them from the danger. On awaking, Francis prayed our Lord to explain to him the meaning of this, and he learnt that the hen represented himself, and the chickens were his disciples, ...
— The Life and Legends of Saint Francis of Assisi • Father Candide Chalippe
... under exposure to white contact, as are the weakest of the tribe. Their familiar attractions all broken, their immemorial traditions rudely dispelled, their natural leadership destroyed, the members of a wild tribe, strong and weak together, become the easy prey of the rascally ...
— The Indian Question (1874) • Francis A. Walker
... question whether spelling correctly, and being able to write a letter and cast up accounts, will harm any woman. Widows often have a sorry time when they know nothing of affairs, and become the prey of designing people. I have had large matters to manage and should have had a troublesome time had I ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... establishment of her daughters, forced to bear and to conceal these disappointments, still continued to form new schemes with indefatigable perseverance. Yet every season the difficulty increased; and Mrs. Falconer, in the midst of the life of pleasure which she seemed to lead, was a prey to perpetual anxiety. She knew that if any thing should happen to the commissioner, whose health was declining; if he should lose Lord Oldborough's favour, which seemed not impossible; if Lord Oldborough should not be able to maintain himself in power, or if he should die; she and her daughters ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... he be doing during those long evenings? He would often come in on foot or in a hackney cab when I returned in a carriage—I, his secretary! Was so pious a man a prey to vices hidden under hypocrisy? Did he expend all the powers of his mind to satisfy a jealousy more dexterous than Othello's? Did he live with some woman unworthy of him? One morning, on returning from I have forgotten what shop, where I had just ...
— Honorine • Honore de Balzac
... pursuit, with orders to massacre the whole. But in this instance, through the gallant assistance of the Parghiotes, and the energetic haste of the Suliotes, the accursed wretch was disappointed of his prey. As to all the other detachments of the Suliotes, who were scattered at different points, and were necessarily thrown everywhere upon their own resources without warning or preparation of any kind,—they, by the terms of the treaty, had liberty ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... noble aims, it had generosity, it had loyalty, it had a very real reverence for purity and religion; but it was young in experience of a new world, it was wanting in self-mastery, it was often pedantic and self-conceited; it was an easier prey than it ought to have been to discreditable temptations. And there is a long interval between any of Spenser's superficial and thin conceptions of character, and such deep and subtle creations as Hamlet or Othello, just as Bunyan's strong but narrow ideals of religion, true as they are up ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... times, Po-shai-an-ki-a, the father of the sacred bands, or tribes, lived with his followers in the City of Mists, the Middle Place, guarded by six warriors, the prey gods. Toward the North, he was guarded by Long Tail, the mountain lion; West by Clumsy Foot, the bear; South by Black-Mark Face, the badger; East by Hang Tail, the wolf; above by White Cap, the ...
— Myths and Legends of California and the Old Southwest • Katharine Berry Judson
... condition of the country was such that they had to bury the money they were carrying in the house of a friend at Adowa, and abide there for several months, until they could, with great prudence and by travelling only at night, venture to pass through districts infested with thieves, and a prey to the ...
— A Narrative of Captivity in Abyssinia - With Some Account of the Late Emperor Theodore, - His Country and People • Henry Blanc
... not displeased to imagine her Richard a man of gallantry; he would in that case be less likely to fall a victim to undowered charms. "It is not your man-about-town who sacrifices his future in a love-match," was her reflection. On the other hand, no one knew better than herself what an easy prey to woman's wiles is a young gentleman without experience. It was for this reason, as well as because she loved to have her boy about her, that she had opposed Richard's going to Midlandshire. She knew Carew too well to hope that he would ever take into favor ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... "They prey upon the pilgrims who pass along the Winchester Road, and they are well loved by the folk in these parts, for they rob none of them and have an open hand for all ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... deprived of the rights, immunities, and privileges of American citizens? Is the rod of oppression held over us by the General Government? Has that Government manifested its care towards us by sending persons to 'spy out our liberties, misrepresent our character, prey upon us, and eat out our substance?' It is not pretended that there is a murmur of the kind. We are in possession of the most enlarged liberty and the most liberal favors. Then why urge this measure, uncalled for by the people, unwarranted by the ...
— History of the Constitutions of Iowa • Benjamin F. Shambaugh
... but Zillah was now a prey to this new trouble. How could she live? She was penniless. Could she consent to remain thus a burden on kind friends like these? These thoughts agitated her incessantly, preying upon her mind, and never leaving her by night ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... gnash and gnarl Thine outward, case thy soul with coating like the marle Satan stamps flat upon each head beneath his hoof! And how deliver such? The strong men keep aloof, Lover and friend stand far, the mocking ones pass by, Tophet gapes wide for prey: lost soul, despair and die! What then? 'Look unto me and be ye saved!' saith God: 'I strike the rock, outstreats the life-stream at my rod! Be your sins scarlet, wool shall they seem like,—although As crimson red, yet turn white ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... of natural selection could we expect to make man immune to the evils of bad air. The robust Indian and the Negro, whose races, until the last generation or two, roamed in the open, fell easy prey to tuberculosis as soon as they adopted the white man's houses and clothes. The Anglo-Saxons who have withstood the influence of indoor living for several generations have, probably by the survival of the fittest, become a little better able to endure it, while the Jews, a race which has lived ...
— How to Live - Rules for Healthful Living Based on Modern Science • Irving Fisher and Eugene Fisk
... the poisonous talons of a bird of prey, while it buries its nails in the flesh of its victim, carries also the narcotic ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... first six months of the year 1802 there were meetings of the discontented, which Fouche, who was then Minister of the Police, knew and would not condescend to notice; but, on the contrary, all the inferior agents of the police contended for a prey which was easily seized, and, with the view of magnifying their services, represented these secret meetings as the effect of a vast plot against the Government. Bonaparte, whenever he spoke to me on the subject, expressed himself weary ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... blast him! Thunder rivet him to the Earth! That Vulture, Conscience, prey upon his Heart, and rack ...
— Representation of the Impiety and Immorality of the English Stage (1704); Some Thoughts Concerning the Stage in a Letter to a Lady (1704) • Anonymous
... (krong, singular and plural) provinces: Banteay Mean Cheay, Batdambang, Kampong Cham, Kampong Chhnang, Kampong Spoe, Kampong Thum, Kampot, Kandal, Kaoh Kong, Krachen, Mondol Kiri, Otdar Mean Cheay, Pouthisat, Preah Vihear, Prey Veng, Rotanah Kiri, Siem Reab, Stoeng Treng, Svay Rieng, Takev municipalities: Keb, Pailin, Phnum Penh ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... to amuse myself. If nothing better offered, I made up my mind I would visit the Sheik of Baalbec, and, by pitting my skill against his, prove that I could exclude, when I wished, the haunting thoughts to which my mind had been a prey. ...
— The Blue Wall - A Story of Strangeness and Struggle • Richard Washburn Child
... been huddled but a short time before. They shivered as they watched the fearful sight, and silently clung to each other. But even now they were not beyond danger. The flames, as if angered by losing their human prey, reached out over the water in a final effort to seize the fleeing ones. Showers of blazing embers were poured forth, and fell around the boat, and at times upon the occupants. The women were now kept alert and busy extinguishing these brands ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... and pleasure. If that man drives an ill trade, who to gain the whole world should lose his own soul, then certainly thou art far worse that sells thy soul for a very trifle. Oh, 'tis pity that so precious a thing should be parted withal to be made a prey for the devouring lion, for that which is worse than nothing. If they were branded for desperate wretches that caused their children to pass through the fire to Moloch, surely thou much more that gives thy soul to devouring flames. What meanest thou, O man! ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... Pascal was as if possessed. The state of nervous exhaustion into which overwork and anxiety had thrown him left him an unresisting prey to this haunting fear of madness and death. All the morbid sensations which he felt, his excessive fatigue on rising, the buzzing in his ears, the flashes of light before his eyes, even his attacks of indigestion and his paroxysms of tears, were so many infallible ...
— Doctor Pascal • Emile Zola
... alighted to ask him what was happening at Nimes. 'I hope you do not think of going there,' said he, 'especially at this moment; the excitement is intense, blood has already flowed, and a catastrophe is imminent.' So back we went to our mountain castle, but in a few days became again a prey to the same restlessness, and, not being able to overcome it, decided to go at all risks and see for ourselves the condition of affairs; and this time, neither advice nor warning having any effect, we not only set out, but we arrived at our ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... external ones. The recognition of an object is impossible without a harmony between the changes constituting perception and particular properties coexisting in the environment. Escape from enemies supposes motions within the organism related in kind and rapidity to motions without it. Destruction of prey requires a particular combination of subjective actions, fitted in degree and succession to overcome a ...
— The World's Greatest Books—Volume 14—Philosophy and Economics • Various
... staring after him, I felt like a murderer of the deepest dye. It is one thing to hand over to the police their natural prey, a thief taken red-handed, but quite another, and a much more harrowing one, to have him slip through your fingers, precipitate himself into mid-air, and drop four stories to the pavement, scattering his brains ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... for something monstrous and horrible? Is there not something horrible in the look and sound of the word afanc, something connected with the opening and shutting of immense jaws, and the swallowing of writhing prey? Is not the word a fitting brother of the Arabic timsah, denoting the dread horny lizard of the waters? Moreover, have we not the voice of tradition that the afanc was something monstrous? Does it not say that Hu the Mighty, the ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow
... who was a good way a-head of his servants, calling out to spare the gentlemen, and bending his course to relieve the prostrate sufferers, two of the four quitted their prey, and mounting, joined the other two horsemen, and advanced to meet him, with a shew of supporting the two men on foot in their violence; who continued laying on the wretches, with the but-ends of ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... arms. Separated from the bustling mart and busy traffic, by the winding river that divided the little city into North and South X—, it crested an eminence on the north; and the single lower story flanking the main edifice east and west, resembled the trailing wings of some vast bird of prey, an exaggerated simulacrum of a monstrous gray condor perched on a "coigne of vantage," waiting to swoop upon its victims. Encircled by a tall brick wall, which was surmounted by iron spikes sharp as bayonets, that defied escalade, the grounds extended ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... richness of their lands. These were divided among the soldiers with their lands and buildings, as conquered towns. Among the number were Capua, Rhegium, Venusia, Beneventum, Nuceria and Vibo. Thus the most beautiful part of Italy became the prey ...
— Public Lands and Agrarian Laws of the Roman Republic • Andrew Stephenson
... the ice; the hunter then cuts a hole with his trench, and with a stick which he carries along with him feels for the beaver; should he find one, he introduces his bare arm into the hole, and seizing his prey by the tail, drags it out on the ice, where it is dispatched with a spear. There is less danger in this operation than one would imagine, for the beaver allows itself to be seized without a struggle, but sometimes inflicts severe ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean
... mingled with the rain that poured down his face. A pod of the fishhook-barbed cholla drove its points through his trousers into the flesh of his knee and, detaching itself from the stem, as is the detestable habit of this vegetable blood-seeker, clung there like a live thing of prey, from barbs which must later be removed delicately and separately with the cold steel. Blindly homing, a jack-rabbit ran almost beneath the horse's hooves, causing him to shy again, this time into a bulky vizcaya, as big as a full-grown man, and inflicting upon Ban a new species of scarification. ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Dissolue my life, the next Caesarian smile, Till by degrees the memory of my wombe, Together with my braue Egyptians all, By the discandering of this pelleted storme, Lye grauelesse, till the Flies and Gnats of Nyle Haue buried them for prey ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... executed of their own accord—a very general fact as is proven by the incessant movements of butterflies, flies, birds, and even fishes, which often appear to play in the water rather than to seek prey; the mad running of horses, dogs, etc., in free space. (3) Mimicry of hunting, i.e., playing with a living or dead prey: the dog and cat following moving objects, a ball, feather, etc. (4) Mimic battles, teasing and fighting without anger. (5) ...
— Essay on the Creative Imagination • Th. Ribot
... and bitterly complained that they were being led to the shambles, while the officers almost openly exclaimed: "We must make peace, for we don't know how to make war." This was again apparent. Bonaparte forestalled their attack. Their divided forces fell an easy prey to Massena, who at Bassano cut Wuermser's force to pieces and sent the debris flying down the valley of the Brenta. Losing most of their artillery, and separated in two chief bands, the Imperialists seemed doomed ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... living on each other; the cunning obtain the property of the simple; wealth picks the pockets of poverty; success is a highwayman leaping from the hedge. The rich combine, the poor are unorganized, without the means to act in concert, and for that reason become the prey of combinations and trusts. The great questions are: Will man ever be sufficiently civilized to be honest? Will the time ever come when it can truthfully be said that right is might? The lives of millions of ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll
... letters written and sealed with the king's seal ring, saying to the rulers of every province in the kingdom that all Jews, both young and old, throughout the kingdom, must be destroyed in one day, and their goods, and money, and lands be taken for a prey, and the thirteenth day of the twelfth month was set in which ...
— Child's Story of the Bible • Mary A. Lathbury
... slumber," but it had the heads of a Hydra hissing and tearing at one another. The chiefs who defended the country by their arms, compromised her by their arguments, and some of her best fighters were little better than pirates and bandits. Greece was a prey to factions—republican, monarchic, aristocratic—representing naval, military, and territorial interests, and each beset by the adventurers who flock round every movement, only representing their own. During the first two years of success they were held in embryo; during the ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... and Seabridge and the Foam might have belonged to another period of existence. At the risk of detection he had hung round the Wheelers night after night for a glimpse of the girl for whom he was enduring all these hardships, but without success. He became a prey to nervousness and, unable to endure the suspense any longer, determined to pay a stealthy visit to Wapping and ...
— A Master Of Craft • W. W. Jacobs
... the baronet's time to triumph; and indeed the bitter glancing look he gave at the squire, although it was intended for Reilly, resembled that which one of the more cunning and ferocious beasts of prey makes previous to its death-spring upon its victim. The old man's countenance instantly fell. He looked with surprise, not unmingled with sorrow and distrust, at Reilly, a circumstance which did not escape his daughter, who could not, for the life of her, ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... highly cultivated mind which seemed to promise in early life eminence in society, and that he would rise to be an ornament to the age in which he lived." At a comparatively early age he had outlived all his family, and thus became the owner of large landed property. He suddenly became a prey to strange, overmastering habits of indolence, apathy, and shyness, which gradually estranged him from all society. He neglected his property, allowed his rents to remain for years and years in the hands of his ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume IV (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... anybody, more especially to a power so insignificant as the Barbary States. Yet such was the fact. Lying along the north coast of Africa were the half-civilized states of Morocco, Tunis, Tripoli, and Algiers, and most of their income was from piracy. All merchantmen were their prey; they divided the loot and sold the crews into slavery. Many nations, to secure immunity from these outrages, paid a stated sum yearly to these powers, and the United States ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... scaffold,—she who had so wept for her son, the first Dauphin, who died the 4th of June, 1789, at the beginning of the Revolution,—the disinterrers of kings violated the grave of this child and threw his bones on the refuse heap. Iconoclasts, jealous of death, disputed its prey, and they profaned among others the sepulchres of Madame Henrietta of England, of the Princess Palatine, of the ...
— The Duchess of Berry and the Court of Charles X • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... was a shriek of horror, for a couple of sharks, excited by the sight of prey standing so near the edge of the waves that ran over the natural pier, made a swoop down upon the young officer, who in his hurry and excitement let loose the ring of rope he had snatched from Rogers, and it was seen to descend through the ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn
... is a process betwixt the Lord and your father's house, but your name is taken out of it. How dear was heaven bought for you by Jesus Christ? he frequently said, "I know there is wrath against it, but I shall get my soul for a prey."——Oftimes he said, "It is a sweet word God saith, As I live, I delight not in the death of a sinner. I will not let go the hold I have got of Jesus Christ; though he should slay me, yet will I ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... quarrels about territory were kept up, and in 1784 the troubles in Wyoming and in the Green Mountains came to the very verge of civil war. People in Europe, hearing of such things, believed that the Union would soon fall to pieces and become the prey of foreign powers. It was disorder and calamity of this sort that such men as Hutchinson had feared, in case the control of Great Britain over the colonies should cease. George III. looked upon it all with ...
— The War of Independence • John Fiske
... adopted the fashion of scepticism, which then ruled the leading minds of all lands; and just as he lapsed back into toryism when the spell which drew him away from it had spent its force, so he became, in the decline of his powers, a prey to religious terrors. For twenty-two years, as we have said, he held aloof from religion, its ministers, and its temples. The disease that preyed upon him so sharpened his temper, and so perverted his perceptions ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... going on, and the 'crimps' were marking down their prey, the crew of the fire-float had located the fire and cut a hole in the 'tween-decks above the hottest part. Through this a big ten-inch hose was passed, and soon the rhythmic clank-clank of their pump brought ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... until his silken floor was in place again and ready for the death dance of flies and bees and wasps. Soon a bumble bee was kicking and quivering like a stricken ox on its surface. The spider rushed upon him and buried his knives in the back and sides of his prey. The young man's observation of this interesting process was interrupted by the sound of voices and the tread of feet. They ...
— In the Days of Poor Richard • Irving Bacheller
... are the largest and most active of our British insects, and, to quote the descriptive words of Professor Rymer Jones, "are pre-eminently distinguished by the rapidity of their flight and the steadiness of their evolutions while 'hawking' for prey in the vicinity of ponds and marshy grounds, where in hot summer weather they are everywhere to be met with. Equally conspicuous from their extreme activity, their gorgeous colours, and the exquisite ...
— Country Walks of a Naturalist with His Children • W. Houghton
... had taken place among them; that the tomahawks of the stronger tribes had thinned the others; that many had sold their lands to the whites, and retired to the west of the Mississippi; and that thousands had fallen a prey to the small-pox. It was in the year 1838 that this dreadful disease was introduced among the Mandans, and other tribes of the fur-traders. Of the Blackfeet, Crows and two or three other tribes, twenty-five thousand ...
— History, Manners, and Customs of the North American Indians • George Mogridge
... shall hear, I guess, that my property has been swept off to save from starving the hungry banditti, whom they cannot support but by theft and robbery. My faithful slave is murdered, and my goods are taken for a prey—and Wamba—where is Wamba? Said not some one he had gone forth ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... crowd threw him out from the sidewalk, a carriage separated him from it, and when the way was clear the mob surged on after its prey. Clerambault followed it with his eyes; the sound of his own voice was still in his ears,—he did not feel ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... appears capable of stronger attachment. It is also reproached with treachery and cruelty; but are not the artifices it uses, the particular instincts which the all-wise Creator has given it, conformable to the purposes for which it is designed? Being destined to prey upon the mouse, a lively, active animal, possessing many means of escape, artifice is absolutely necessary for the accomplishment of its end. I can, however, say nothing in extenuation of its cruelty, in sporting with the unfortunate victim that falls into its power, in prolonging ...
— Domestic pleasures - or, the happy fire-side • F. B. Vaux
... not a defender, nor a friend, in this voracious crowd; the French colony itself appeared satisfied with the fall of a courtier who had so long monopolized the roads to favour. To attempt to snatch this prey from the Bey, excepting by a striking triumph at the Assembly, was not to be thought of. All that de Gery could hope for was to save some shreds of his fortune, and this only if he hurried, for he was expecting day by day to learn of his ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... off by powerful charms. Could the voice which had bewitched Alonzo have come from one of these? Perhaps, who knows, it might be the voice of the dreaded Yara herself, who sought young men on the eve of their marriage as her prey. ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... trepidation on our side was intense. At last the graceful body stuck across a bigger tree and swung on it for some minutes. The oscillation slowly ceased, and tree and goat became motionless. There our prey stuck fast. ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... prey, however, of the Merlin during the time it remains in the Islands is the Ring Dotterell, which at that time of year is to be found in large flocks mixed with Purres and Turnstones in all the low sandy or ...
— Birds of Guernsey (1879) • Cecil Smith
... arrangements of garlands and wreaths intended to represent umbrellas of dignity. Sometimes a man riding on a wooden horse is carried, horse and all, by his friends as the Raja, and others assume the form of or paint themselves up to represent certain beasts of prey. Behind this motley group the main body form compactly together as a close column of dancers in alternate ranks of boys and girls, and thus they enter the grove, where the meeting is held in a cheery dashing style, wheeling and countermarching and forming lines, circles and columns with grace ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... rushing at the shoal, and smashing into an avalanche of snowy foam. They could hear the dull roar of the sea, and its mighty thunder, as it curled over and fell furiously upon itself, for want of other prey. ...
— Labrador Days - Tales of the Sea Toilers • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell
... Colonel av the rig'mint had a daughter—wan av thim lamblike, bleatin', pick-me-up-an'-carry-me-or-I'll-die gurls such as was made for the natural prey av men like the Capt'n, who was iverlastin' payin' coort to her, though the Colonel he said time an' over, 'Kape out av the brute's way, my dear.' But he niver had the heart for to send her away from the throuble, bein' as he was a widower, an' she ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... probable they were the property of James Cecil, fourth Earl of Salisbury (a descendant of Lord Burghley's younger son), who succeeded to the title in 1683, and died in 1694. He was mixed up in the troubles of the time, and was, says Macaulay, 'foolish to a proverb,' and the 'prey of gamesters.' John Cecil, Earl of Exeter, from 1678 to 1700, who was descended from Lord Burghley's elder son, was himself a book collector, and therefore not likely to part with the library of ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher |
